Everyone, almost everyone, has given you good advice. I will add this. Do not live and die by a "pat on the back" you get from coaches after the game. If we let that bother us we would all quit because it is very emotional for a lot of coaches and they will not be happy with you after a loss.



IMHO
If I'm thinking of this the way Uncle Ernie means it
I hope I understand what he is saying

DON'T, I repeat, DON'T console a coach after your partner gave him a T for an obvious reason. No lengthy explaination, no close interaction and no "why did you....." Once again I might have it wrong but, this is showing sympathy for a coach and can divide a crew. I would think "why is he comforting that coach after he just cussed me out" or whatever he did. In a two person game there shouldn't be anyone by the coach and in a 3 person game I will purposely turn my back to the coach and look at the other 9 players just so someone in the top row will be able to see that I'm not talking to the coach about the T. It is simple communication "coach you got a T and you must sit for the rest of the game." We have to stay togeter on the court. At most you have 6 people on your team and as little as 2 people.

R, U1, U2, scorer, timer and shot clock operator. Or R and U. We have to stick together.
If I didn't understand you Uncle Ernie I'm sorry but I have been on the sidelines and in the game when this happened and it isn't good.

I agree with all of the other replies (execpt the one liners, they are fun to hear but don't use them in your game :)). One thing you can do if a coach is yelling at you go tell him he/she doesn't need to yell, you can hear them just fine. If that brings them down and they start "talking" or shut-up - good job; however, if they yell again I would whack 'em. I hear you is always a good response to a coach too. Great job working those two games one-man, that is tough to do.

D

I would like to thank everyone for their help and suggestions. You guys are the reason I started officiating. About 3 years ago, I started lurking on this board (got the URL from a coaches forum)to find out why all the refs I had during my games were so bad (not realizing mostly all of them were first or second year refs, or refs that had not passed their exams). At that time I was coaching 7th and 8th grade boys and 5th and 6th grade girls (very small school, no one volunteered, so I did it). After reading here, I really started watching the refs and saw they were trying to apply things they learned from class into the games, and my talking, yelling, et al did not help them concentrate on their games. I was probably making them worse than they really were.

I really love the game. Played HS, College, coached every level (still coaching AAU in the spring)except college, and now reffing at 49. You old timers (not age, just board time) have helped me in every aspect of the game especially Mick, ChuckElias, JR, Rut, Dan_ref, tomegun, Back in the Saddle, and BktBallRef.

I have read with great interest how RainMaker has evolved as a ref and just hope I can come close to being as understanding and as good as she is.

And BktBallRef do you know me? Your post:
**************
Well, it's all pretty much been said. What have we learned?

#1 - Don't bait the coach.

#2 - When he gets ugly, give him a stern warning.

#3 - The next time he gets ugly, bust his a$$, and get away.

#4 - BUT, if you can't get away and he wants another one, give it to him.

Now, aren't you ashamed of your behavior when you were a coach?
**************

How did you know my behavior was that bad? And yes, looking back I am very much ashamed of the way I acted in some games (although not quite as bad as what happened to me, I usually stopped after the first "T").

Again, thank you to all. By the way did a CYO pre Christmas tourney championship game last night, close game all the way until the end when one of the teams nailed 3 straight 3 pointers. Had a blast. Still need work with my mechanics and am sometimes calling in my partners primary (sometimes I see things and react quickly, need to slow down and trust my partner, and probably shouldn't even be looking there) but overall I really had fun! It is a good feeling when the losing coach shakes your hand and says good game. That's how I know I called a decent game.

No, I don't think I know you personally but I've met you a hundred times. I work one of your games about once a week. You're on the sideline complaining about things you don't understand. You think we're making calls against your team because we don't like you. We don't like your team either. It's bad enough when you win but when you lose, man! It's bad!

I would say that well over 90% of coaches go through this. Fortuantely, most mature as a coach, their knowledge improves and they focus on things they can actually control. They realize that we do this because we love it, that we're all going to miss 'em now and then and that we're not out to get you. If they didn't, very few of us would be working.

My statement was just a lucky, high percentage guess. ;)

"Coach, I'm blind not deaf!" :)

Please, don't ANYONE use what the coach says as a "good judge of how you called a game". Although it's nice when they say "good game", just because they say, "you sucked" doesn't necessarily mean we called a bad game.

Two thoughts to ponder...

1.) Perhaps officials who have only been officiating a year or so shouldn't be officiating in championship games.

2.) Inexperienced officials turn to T's because they don't know how to rectify a tough situation or talk a coach in off the ledge.

[Edited by Indy_Ref on Dec 16th, 2003 at 02:58 PM]

along these same lines....
 

When they tell me good call, I like to say,"It's that law of averages thing."

Handling Coaches

Types of Coaches

The Good Guy
The Time Bomb-easy to know when he "goes off"
The Toothache: never goes away
The Hemorrhoid: never lets up
The Surgeon: dissects you for 32 minutes and you don't
even know it

Dealing with Coaches successfully:

Don't argue
Be firm and be Fair
Be courteous
Avoid Eye to Eye
Don't use their language
Lend a reasonable ear

Calling the Technical Foul

Know your tolerance threshold
Consider giving an initial strong warning. Let your
partner know about the warning.
After calling the T, talk with your partner. Know what
to do next
Get away from coach. Partner needs to help avoid an
immediate 2nd T
Take a deep breath to calm yourself
Report clearly to the table
Reminder- Head coach must sit after technical foul is
called. This also includes an indirect
technical foul asssessed to the head coach.
Coach may rise to applaud a good play, call
a timeout or request a timer/scorer/official
error per rulebook

The conduct of coaches continually amazes me, particularly at the middle school level you spoke of. I have coached two seasons a year of bball for 15 years (girls in the fall, boys in the winter) and am constantly amazed at how my opposing coach conduct him/herself. Perhaps I'm just to slow and dimwitted to worry about both my players AND the officiating. If a young coach ever asks me for advice (I don't see a line forming yet) I think the first words from my mouth are going to be "just shut up and coach. You are a PROFESSIONAL! Act like one!" If some of my collegues would just remember that they are role models, particularly at the 5/6 & 7/8 grade levels, perhaps we wouldn't have 16 year olds who taunt, bait, disrespect opponents and officials. God this stuff irritates me...sorry to go off but you struck a chord.

Wish you worked in Portland. We have a couple coaches here, who act like you do, and they are so nice to work for. One game I had one like you and one of the other kind. The Other Kind says, "He's just trying to butter you up." I thought, "Yea, maybe so, but if it works, shouldn't you be trying it?"

Nice to hear this coming from a coach.

What makes the situation worse is these young hot heads are paired with new refs (mostly) who don't know how to handle this type of thing in a professional manner themselves.

Seems it might have been the perfect thing to say to him, you might have gotten the chance to see the lightbulb go on over his head. :)

btw, you think coach meant to use the big G or the little g in his post?

:p

I didn't want to imply that I was favoring the other coach, even though I suppose I was.

Little g, I hope. Big G in that context, kinda pushes my buttons.

Sorry about that...how about this?

"Gosh this stuff irritates me."

Coach, it's definitely my problem, and I usually control it, although I wish they'd develop a medication that helped! You're un-howler enough that I can let the occasional big G slide. Gosh, Golly, Gee Whiz, all sound so lame, I know. Actually, the sentence stands pretty tall with no expletive at all. But don't worry about me, in this case. I'm definitely not T'ing for it.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by WinterWillie

Quote:

Originally posted by OldCoachNewRef Dealing with Coaches successfully: Don't argue Be firm and be Fair Be courteous Avoid Eye to Eye Don't use their language Lend a reasonable ear

I agree with most, but I always look them in the eye and I do use "their language", but only so they can hear it.

D